Tag: abuse

Don’t you just hate it when someone twists your words, gets all heated up, and attacks you – using your own words – to put you on the defensive or make you upset. What’s happening? What can you do when someone’s twisting your words to make you look bad.

First of all, this is a common practice in the media because it creates the best soundbites, which causes people to tune in to your news show, radio program, media event, or a potentially viral meme on social media. In this arena, it’s called “spin,” and it’s an acceptable practice covered by free speech and parody, especially in public venues. Nonetheless, your words can be a very powerful weapon to hurt, harm, or disable any potential for good someone might have had in the world.

Far more common is the way someone in your social circle might twist your words to make you look bad. This is a tool used by many individuals who are not self-confident, have been severely victimized in the past, or live under high degrees of oppression, stress, or fear.

Twisting your words to make you look bad is an effective defense mechanism utilized by someone to project ideas hidden deep within their heart or psyches onto you, which releases the emotional pressure from unresolved emotional wounds left to fester and grow.

Such a person is not likely to be open to your suggestion of this fact. If wounded people are looking for demons, they will find them everywhere they look, until they awake to the idea that they might have some negative repression that is happening inside, and are willing to not only look at it but do the work of dealing with these issues to resolve them.

In the meantime, they will twist your words to make you look bad, which can have a huge negative impact on you, making you actually feel bad. When used effectively, the damaged individual twisting your words will make you feel bad, and this causes the sufferer to feel better, as they have transferred their pent-up emotional pain to you. This offers them relief. That’s why they do it.

He or she will continue to project these ideas onto you because his or her reward is feeling better about his-or-her-self by twisting your words to make you look bad. So, they are highly motivated to engage in this assaultive and potentially abusive activity.

In normal circumstances, you would be motivated to defend yourself against this attack or false accusation. It is a normal reaction to defend yourself if you’ve been falsely accused. The only problem with reacting defensively is that it creates more momentum for the breeding ground of this unfortunate circumstance which you’ve found yourself in.

Understanding this might offer you enough emotional space to not react defensively. Instead of adding more energy to the confrontation, which causes an increasing cycle of adding energy to an impossible situation, because no amount of your defensiveness or rationale will slay the emotionally injured person’s demons.

Plus, you can have some compassion or empathy for the person who is twisting your words in an accusatory fashion, because you know they are wounded and suffering inside, being careful not to feel sorry for them, because that would insinuate your superiority. Instead, you realize that if you were him or her, having lived the life he or she has lived up to this point, you would have reacted in exactly the same way.

A simple and calm response, such as, “That’s not what I meant, but you’re entitled to your own opinion,” might be enough to side-step a potentially volatile situation. If you don’t want to make things worse, it’s best to just avoid any conflict in this situation.

No one can make you look or feel bad unless you empower them by adding fuel to their fire and being defensive. There is no need for you to respond to anyone’s ridiculous false accusations or attempts to make you look bad.

Simply do not respond to anyone’s attempts to attack or discredit you, whether they are twisting your words, or concocting their own, unless you choose to offer clarification, for any part that may be true. But if you do offer clarification, try to find the space to think through the ramifications for doing so, because you may be offering up even more ammunition for them to fire back at you with even more word twisting.

If you are masterfully self-aware and tolerant, you might offer yourself up as a shock absorber for this person to release as much of their pent-up frustrations as possible. To do so effectively, you must have the ability or skill of letting someone verbally attack or abuse you without being emotionally engaged. A martyr might do so in lieu of having the ability or skill to avoid suffering the emotional consequences. Unless this is your calling or part of your life’s purpose, this will likely not apply to you.

So, we’ve discussed why people in public venues and media might twist your words, and why those who are emotionally wounded, or low self-esteem might do so, but we haven’t talked about why a psychopath or someone on the predatory end of the anti-social personality spectrum might twist your words to make you feel bad.

Their motivation is to undermine or destroy you and/or your credibility altogether. This is an entirely different subject, yet your response should be the same. Do not add fuel to the fire by defending yourself, walk away, and find someplace safe to be, where you can avoid the psychopath or sociopath.

If you’ve ever been in a knock down drag out fight you know what it feels like to be hit by someone. Adrenaline and other hormones cascade overwhelming your state of being as you as immediately find yourself in fight or flight. Being part of a brutal smackdown is no fun and the trauma, pain, and suffering that comes from the physical abuse can endure and cause even more suffering as you try to heal from the event over time.

How curious is it when we are similarly affected by the spoken words of someone?

When you feel as though someone has disrespected, insulted, ignored, judged, or rejected you, BAM! Just as though you’d been kicked in the guts, all the pain, emotional and physical with all the feelings and hormone overload.

When this happens to you, those words, which cut like a knife, were likely spoken by someone you love, trust, or highly regard. They could be your partner, a family member, a child, a neighbor, someone you work with or for. Because you are more connected to these people than others in your life, their words cut the deepest, can crush you, and leave your heart bleeding in pain and sorrow.

Those you care about the most hurt you the most

The concept, “those you care about the most hurt you the most” rings true.

Interestingly enough, this concept was programmed into your psyche since the day you were born. Based on your life experience, you learned to love and depend on others. Early on, you realized that if you disappointed the people you loved and trusted to take care of you, they would turn on you, leaving you in a state of fear and suffering.

That’s where it starts, and it grows as you trust and are betrayed by those who you love and care for along the way, when all you really wanted was to be accepted, respected, and loved for no other reason than you love others. Family, friends, lovers, fellow students, teachers, and others in your circle of influence. Why can’t they just love you back?

We have been programmed to value the opinion of others so highly that the slightest threat of potentially not being highly regarded by someone we care about can threaten our very sense of existence. Our feelings are hurt. We can either strike back and start an all-out war of words (or worse), and if we’re unable to strike back (for fear of being hurt even worse), we find someone else who we are stronger than to strike out at to release the angst inside. Or we can find ourselves sinking to the depths of depression, even contemplating suicide as a way out of the pain.

You were socially programmed to want what others want, to desire to do the things that others do with them as a part of the crowd. Giving you a sense of belonging, in the belief there is safety and security by being accepted by others, for to be alone would be potentially dangerous, or too much to bear.

This social programming has been a disservice to your highest and best because you were meant for so much more than just being just another sheep in the herd.

Blessed are those who were raised in an empowered sense of individuality and personal awareness. They possess the power of seeing themselves as separate, and in the best-case scenarios, also see themselves as part of the greater whole of community and humanity, though these days this represents a very small percentage of us.

To expect someone to know and appreciate you for all that you are sets you up for disappointment and failure, and your feelings will always be hurt because no one can ever know and appreciate you as much as you do.

Likewise, no matter how hard you try, you can’t fully “get” anyone else. So much goes on inside the heart and mind of everyone that you will never know. Just like when you are silent, your mind keeps working and think thoughts you might never convert to spoken word.

What’s the answer?

There is great personal power in realizing that what anyone thinks or says about you has nothing to do with you at all. It’s about them.

You know that you are always intentionally authentic, open, honest, and want the best for everyone in your life. You know you are always worthy of the best things in this life, and you would never do anything intentionally to hurt anyone you cared about. You don’t need anyone else’s validation of these things because you know them to be true. Your knowledge of and confidence in you is unshakeable.

From this vantage point, if someone barks something that might have hurt your feelings in the past, you can feel compassion for the person who felt like he or she had to react in such a say. And instead of being threatened or hurt by what they said or did, you can just look at them lost in their own life-struggle and think (or say, if appropriate), “That’s interesting.”

You know you can respond with love and compassion because you know that you were like that too.

You are emotionally resilient and bulletproof.

You are no longer a victim of anyone else’s disrespect or abuse.

You don’t have to defend yourself or strike back because they didn’t actually do or say anything that could hurt you. You can bless them because you know they are just doing the best they can with what they have.

The invisible ties that bind us together are unseen shackles which keep us tethered together. These energetic cords are like umbilical cords through which the person or people that to whom we are connected draws energy, our very life force, from us.

You become connected to so many people throughout your course of life, and if you continue through life without doing a bit of spiritual and emotional cord-cutting, you remain deeply connected to the people whom you’d be better off freeing yourself from.

The first cords you establish are those that connect you to your parents, good or bad, loving or hateful, these cords connect you to your parents for life, unless you can go through the process of freeing yourself from their energy drain.

You are also energetically corded to people you admired, loved, cared for, people who have befriended you, done a favor for you, have had sex with you, or abused you. You can feel the connection when you think about any of these people. That energetic charge is very active because you are still connected to these people, and they are draining your energy, not unlike energy vampires, even though they may not be currently actively participating in your life today.

Whenever you make a promise, vow, or are indebted to someone, an energetic cord is connected. The connection remains, even long after the situation is rectified, expired, or the debt has been paid, unless you go about the work of disconnecting this invisible energetic connection.

You may have gone about the work of severing your relationship with a person from your past, yet, the invisible ties that bind remain keeping you connected to a person whose energy you would be better off without. As long as you are still connected to this person (these people) you will be unable to focus your energies and abilities to achieve your highest and best.

You will still be able to maintain a better life, but while these cords remain and persist in draining your precious energy, you may be prevented from realizing your best life.

Especially in past relationships, when you have pledged your love to someone, even long after that relationship has run its course, the connection and the energy drain persists as you continue to be haunted by the person you promised to love.

Traumatic energy connections also keep you connected to individuals and incidents which you would much rather be free from, holding you back and restraining your full potential in the present moment. These negative energetic cords are a leading contributor to Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD).

While you remain connected, you will continue to attract these people to whom you are connected or other people who share a similar vibration, life, lifestyle, negative energy, or psychological profile.

When this energy remains connected to you, it clouds your vision and will project itself onto those new people, relationships, situations, and circumstances, triggering false cues or suspicions as the energy of the connection is projected onto your viewscreen of the present.

As unfair as it might seem, it remains a matter of fact, that unless these cords are cut, and you are free from these energetic drains from the past, it will hinder your potential to live your best life, free from these shadows and connections, and it may lead to physiological decline in health, wellness, and may promote a sensitivity to disease.

Psychotherapy might suggest a violent attempt to dig down into the recesses of your mind, having to drag you through each detail of the past, which is a traumatic process in itself, and though it may be effective, can take months or years of therapy (which works incredibly well for the therapists bottom-line).

For this reason, I prefer more modern (or ancient) methods of cutting cords from the past which are far less invasive, instantaneous, and have lasting results.

Think about how you know this to be true and ask yourself if you think now is a good time to sever the invisible ties that bind you to the past, so you can live a better life, your best life, and make the world a better place.

Isn’t it time to reduce conflict at home? Sometimes people just can’t seem to get along and this leads to a lot of conflict at home, work, school, among friends, and even while driving. When you get upset at something that someone else does, says, or communicates in some other way, you are likely to experience some degree of stress.

The greatest stressors will be initiated by those whom you know the best, the people within your family. While the family unit is no stranger to stress, if there are little witnesses to these active familial stressors, they will be affected the most. This is how children learn to interact with others, and this follows them into adulthood, even if they cannot consciously recall these events.

Even if the conflict does not engage the children directly, they are still being affected by these stressful situations. If you don’t believe me, just think back to familial conflicts which you witnessed when you were a child. How does that affect the way you handle stress and conflict today?

If you have children around watching your interactions with your family, you might consider taking a break or a timeout, the next time you feel tensions building. Maybe you can reason with the person you’re experiencing the conflict with and pick up the discussion at a different place and time. You might be surprised that delaying the discussion will allow you both to revisit the topic when emotions are not running as high.

This works for adults, adults interacting children, and among children as well.

This can have a tremendous effect on reducing the familial stress in relationships, also, it gives whoever might be inclined to do some deep inner work time to reflect on his or her own past to see if there are any hidden anchors from the past triggering the feelings which are being experienced in the moment.

If you are in a relationship with someone and are not able to manage taking a break or timeout, then you might consider seeking a relationship coach, counselor, consultant, or a member of the clergy, whatever appeals to you and seek assistance from a qualified third party, someone you can trust.

There are many techniques which can be applied to any type of relationship which will reduce both conflict and stress, and it’s up to you to check it out and take the appropriate steps to change your life. No one else is going to do it for you.

This is your life, and those whom you care about deserve not to be impaired by your lack of control, and left to itself unhindered by someone’s drawing explicit boundaries, not seeing eye to eye, or having different points of view, could turn into an abusive situation.

If ever, any relationship is visited by abuse, you have the right and the responsibility to stop the abuse. You are never required to fight back if there is abuse. Just take the steps necessary to isolate yourself from any further abuse.

This takes a great deal of courage and determination, but you can do it.

You’ve been trained to desire unconditional love. You want to be loved for who you are, everything, the good, the bad, your adorable traits and the mistakes you have made and may make from this day forward. To feel as though you could be accepted and loved no matter what is what you long for.

You can look back on decisions and actions you’ve initiated in your past didn’t turn out the way you planned and may have turned out badly, possibly making you look and feel stupid. You know you could have done better if given a second chance. After all, your intentions were pure when you did it or allowed it to happen.

To be loved, regardless of the stupid things you’ve done in the past, not judged for those things you could have done better and understood as if anyone in the same situation might have done the same thing seems reasonable. And this is what you long for.

While this kind of unconditional love is what you desire, to imagine the offering of such a love to another feels like a preposterous proposition. This is when the idea of unconditional love makes you angry.

What? Love someone no matter what? Do you think I’ve learned nothing from all the pain I’ve endured throughout the course of my life? Have you lost your mind?

If I’ve learned anything, I know you can’t trust anyone, particularly someone you care about, and the more you care about them, the more they will hurt you, and the less you can trust them.

You have surrounded yourself with a protective forcefield in an effort to keep yourself safe from disappointment or risk of being hurt.

Congratulations. You’ve built for yourself and voluntarily checked-in to your hospital fortress where you can find the love you seek from within and heal, because life has been hard, and you need this time to focus on you, isolated from potential harm.

No one would blame you for feeling bad, sad, or mad while suffering from your wounds in your love hospital for recovery. While recovering from these wounds, of course, the idea of unconditional love makes you angry, anyone else in the same situation would feel the same way.

You are suffering from a form of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), not unlike any other form of PTSD.

If it weren’t for the support of others in their own various stages of love wound recovery, you would be totally alone and isolated in your fortress hospital, and with others who have are also suffering from love’s wounds you develop a supportive camaraderie. This kind of support can prolong your healing as you feel more comfortable in treatment than taking the risk of re-engaging in life outside the walls.

Isn’t the idea of checking one’s self into an isolated healing environment to become well enough to leave the facility and start to live your life again? To not do so transforms your hospital into a prison of your own making to serve out our own self-imposed life sentence. You needn’t suffer the extreme self-abuse of exercising your own love death penalty.

You’re better than that.

You can heal. In fact, you may be far more healed than you believe yourself to be. How many completely healthy people are in hospitals or recovery programs far past their healing because it’s safer to be in the hospital than to face your fears outside in the real world?

It’s time to get up and ambulate. Get outside and exercise your ability to love.

You can still exercise love when the idea of unconditional love makes you angry. No need to push through to unconditional love, but to start loving a little at a time would be highly beneficial.

You might find it helpful to see others as just like you.

You understand yourself so well and you would never intentionally do anything to hurt anyone else, unless in that moment, you felt like you had no other choice, as you were in fully engulfed in the fight-or-flight response. You felt like you had no other option(s).

You don’t have to love what someone else does, but you can still love the person.

Isn’t that what you want?

That is not to say that you allow anyone to abuse you. You have the right and obligation to separate yourself from dangerous situations, but let those situations be an authentic potential risk to you, your body, your mind, or your spirit. Don’t let your fear-inspired imagination to override your ability to find potential danger everywhere you look.

Instead, look to understand and realize that the person with whom you are feeling conflict is looking back at you in the mirror. If you were that person, having lived the same life, you would have done the same thing.

You can feel compassion for that person (not feeling “sorry” for them because that insinuates your superiority), trying to understand what it might like to be like to have to feel as though you might feel like you have to live life, like that. It could make you sad, and even react in a less defensive manner.

Even if the idea of unconditional love makes you angry, don’t let it stop you. Find ways to exercise your love. Start with letting friends in a little deeper. Find a child to love. Make occasions for you to engage in activities that you love, and allow your activities to grow to include more people to participate in those things that you love in public.

Get up. Get out of your love hospital, even if only briefly at first, and one day you will find you no longer rely on your self-restraint and self-imposed love prison sentence.

You have complete control of your release date. You get to leave early based on your healing and good behavior if you want to.

Maybe today is the day.

Write down today’s date, mark it on the calendar, and walk out on your own accord.

Victims of abuse are the superheroes who have come to this planet to experience and absorb the impact of abuse for the benefit of the world at large. Your experience exposes, educates and changes the world, and you are the conduit of the transformative change.

Shock absorbers – victims of abuse

I am so grateful for the victims of the most abhorrent abuses in our modern society. While I would never wish any of the atrocities which have been suffered by these individuals, they have often (if not always and unbeknownst to them) pledged their service to the greater good, and their participation in this special calling is nothing less than heroic.

Sometimes, the act of submitting yourself to suffer abuse on the behalf of others is conscious, like in a hostage situation and the captor(s) are going to torture or kill one of the hostages, and you volunteer to be the first victim. How courageous is that? To sacrifice yourself for the sake of sparing the others. Even if you end up paying the price of your benevolent act of service requires paying the ultimate sacrifice and you give your life for the benefit of others.

In that hostage scenario, you absorbed the shock which faced the entire world in that moment. It was the worst of circumstances which involved and affected the whole world, not just you and the other hostages. It is also a tragic event for the captors, negotiators, law enforcement, reporters, witnesses, healthcare and mental health professionals. Not to mention friends and relatives of active and passive participants, and anyone else who may become aware of the abusive event.

An abusive event ripples through the local community and the world at large.

What about silent victims of abuse?

Placing yourself in harm’s way to absorb any abuse that might otherwise visit someone less equipped to take the abuse is also heroic, even if it takes place in secret and no one ever knows that you’re taking the abuse spared anyone else from having to suffer.

Until the world shifts from barbarianism to enlightenment there will be abuse and someone will have to suffer. And there are those who being a sufferer of abuse is a part of their journey. They actually decided or knew before they were born, that their journey would include this suffering to help make a difference, to change the world, and play an integral part in stopping the patterns of abuse our society turns a blind eye to or tolerates.

Sometimes, someone who has suffered abuse becomes a key component in exposing, reducing, or eliminating that particular type of abuse, while others take it upon themselves to reach out in support of other victims.

Often, a victim of abuse cannot imagine that anyone else could have suffered a similar type of abuse, so a survivor of abuse can be priceless in the rehabilitation process of any abuse victim.

Then, there are others who insist on silently hiding the abuse(s) they’ve suffered never letting anyone know and doing their very best to deal with it without saying a word to anyone or doing anything about it.

I would never advise anyone to subject themselves to abuse. If you have been a victim of abuse, you should see to the cessation of the abuse as soon and effectively as possible.

If you are one of those who has decided to take the abuse and remain in silence, you must do whatever you need to do any way you need to do it. There is no judgment for you here. You are a blessed shock absorber, any way you decide to do it, and you are a blessing.

We feel bad, because we want to help you. We don’t want to see you suffering, like this. Some of us are empathetic and can feel some of the feelings that you are going through or know how we would feel if what you were going through was happening to us, and we would do anything we could to help you.

There are others who know your pain. They have walked in your shoes. They have remained in silence while they were being abused, and they did find a way out. They are here, too, hoping you will reach out to someone. We are all here to support your choice, whether you choose to reach out or not.

No one is doing it wrong.

After all, we’re all doing the best we can with what we have.

May the shock absorbers of the world be blessed for all that you do and endure.

Unless you’re called to live the single life (as some people are), you are genetically designed and physically manifested as an individual who thrives as one-half of a romantic coupling with another. The benefits of this coupling are enhanced by joining together in the sacred bond of marriage.

Notably, there is a huge difference between the benefits of taking wedding vows for a good marriage between two people and the tragic toxicity of trying to manage a bad marriage.

In the best relationships, marriage is good medicine. There are at least 12 health benefits you can enjoy from being in a healthy love relationship with your spouse. It doesn’t have to be perfect by any means, just moderately meaningful, manageable, and positive for the most part.

On the other hand, even though you may enter a relationship with the best intentions, and pledged to be bonded for life, marriage can be very toxic, and thank God, if it is abusive or unmanageable, there is a way out.

If you’re in a toxic or abusive relationship this is a call to arms. You should look for insights within yourself, seek refuge, get out and be safe. No marriage or commitment to a relationship requires your being abused, ever. It only signifies your need to leave, learn, and move on.

For those of you who predisposed to looking for red flags in relationships, some early warning signs of relationships which could potentially go sideways on you might include keeping secrets or withholding (which is tantamount to lying).

Being dishonest, deceptive, sneaking around, and hiding things are signs of something deeper and darker which will show its hidden identity one day.

As you enter into a relationship, if you’re witnessing assertions of “this is yours” and “this is mine” attitude about a variety of things, be aware that this kind of division is counter-intuitive for genuine coupling where the focus should be on the “sharing” of most things.

While the yours-and-mine attitude is generally accepted as a healthy perspective, often supported by relationship professionals and the legal community, it fosters separateness and can be extremely problematic when fighting over what rightly belongs to whom in the process of dissolution which can be extremely traumatic and expensive.

If your mate is likely to spend time pointing out all your faults (or often accusing you of possessing his or her faults) it is highly unlikely that you will ever be good enough for this person, expect it only to get worse.

Conflict in a good relationship leads to resolution, while conflict in an unhealthy relationship demands compliance or sacrifice and often leads to chaos and abuse.

A mate who is unsupportive and selfish will not put forth the effort to put the work into making the relationship better, unless he or she is able to manipulate a relationship therapist or coach to support his or her agendas, as a method to manipulate and mold you for his or her benefit.

If you’re not the most important person in your partner’s life, his or her priorities are not in alignment with the goals of a healthy and happy relationship between two people. This is not to say that your partner should have a healthy independence and positive friends and social connections, only that you should be the most highly regarded person in their circle of influence.

A toxic partner will emphasize your missteps and hold grudges against you ad infinitum when forgiveness and creating a new normal is the order of the day in dealing with relationship shortfalls, loving through our imperfections, leading to a better healing day, moving positively into the future together.

Marriage is a celebration of the life of two people. It is a joining of two people co-creating a positive future together and upholds the sacred potential which surpasses the potential of either party without the other.

Toxic or abusive relationships indicate your need to look within to find why you might have attracted this life circumstance. Please look inside and find what lurks in the dark recesses of your soul because if you don’t, your next relationship will present you with the same problematic circumstances.

Only you have the power to stop this negative relationship cycle by doing the deep inner work and embracing all the love which resides inside of you. Only then, will you be able to move on in unconditional love, which is desperately waiting for you,

One of the most debilitating conditions humans can encounter is that of emotional pain, from loss, abuse or regret. Interestingly, we suffer this pain independently of any physical condition, yet the physiological distress can be as serious as the psychological discomfort.

Indeed our thoughts control our emotions, and our physiological wellbeing. When the past haunts us in our present state of mind, the past is not in the past as it keeps impeding on the present becoming a component of “now,” instead of being safely stored in the past where it belongs.

When one has suffered a psychological trauma (which can be demonstrated physiologically as illness or disease) as a result of something that has happened in the past (like, post traumatic stress disorder, for instance), the standard response from someone who hasn’t walked a mile in your shoes is, “Just get over it. The past is the past.”

Ah, “the past is the past;” the mantra of the psychopath. That’s what a psychopath says when he or she has committed a significant transgression, and expects you to disregard the past because it cannot be changed (here’s where they insert assertions about how much they’ve changed, assuring you that you would never be at-risk again) all in an effort to set you up for the next unexpected blow.

In general, psychopaths are unique in that they have no feelings, no feeling of love, remorse, guilt… they are psychologically bullet-proof (or bankrupt)… they have no need to seek forgiveness, nor do they accept responsibility for their missteps… To those of us who suffer emotionally from being abused, wronged or traumatized, this would be considered a superpower… and in some ways, it is.

Bottling up suppressed emotional trauma related to the past weighs heavily on the normal operating condition of the human body and is not an effective approach to dealing with PTSD.

Thankfully, there are therapeutic models that help people deal with traumatic incidents that have been experienced in the past that continue to thwart our sense of well-being. Enter what I refer to as, “Time Machine Therapy.”

I know that the idea of a time machine seems like a bit too much science fiction for the average person… but time travel has been accomplished using the power of the mind for thousands of years, though some intellectuals insist that it’s only been about 150 years… It doesn’t really matter how long it’s been, what does matter is that it is an effective process that can have valuable healing power today.

With access to this potent therapeutic modality we have challenged that famous catch-all phrase, “the past is the past,” because now, we have a method not only to access the past, but to manipulate or even change the past.

It’s also important to have access to the skills that it takes to let go of the past, to disconnect the physiological connection that leads to discomfort and stress. There are many methods available to help you overcomes traumatic loss or change in your life, and to put you back in the driver’s seat of your life.

Being distracted by the concerns about one’s past makes it difficult to navigate one’s present. That is why it is imperative to deal with the issues of the past for a normal person (does not apply to psychopaths or sociopaths) in order to not have your cognitive resources bogged-down with the burden of yesterday.

It is imperative to begin to live in the present, and you can get you from there to here and powerfully empowered to be the best that you can be.

You might ask, “When accessing or altering the past, do we still retain the lessons learned?”

That’s a good question; and the answer depends on the client. In most cases, we can retain the memories, disconnecting the feelings connected to them. In rare cases, entire memories need to be altered or erased in order to preserve a healthy perspective of the client.

A common response to that is, “That sounds like brainwashing!”

You may associate a lot of negative associations to the idea of tampering with one’s memories, but this is done at the request – and with the full cooperation and consciousness – of the client; and in times of emotional crises time machine therapy is a healthy alternative to a condition that might otherwise be unmanageable.

In the event that wiping the slate clean is necessary, the client is always equipped with the combination to the mental safe that keeps those memories locked safely away, if it becomes important to access them once again.

Once you are in charge of your life again, you will find yourself making positive progress, changing your future and the world for a better life, your best life and make the world a better place. You may feel regret from opportunities that were lost as a result of your previous struggles with issues from your past – as though you have lost a piece of your past that may have been better spent – and may have thought that you lost your chance for this or that… Not true. Once you are back in the present you can be and do more than you may have ever imagined because you are more empowered and aware than ever before.

You will no longer be limited by false inhibitions or past burdens. Everyone deals with the issues of their past in different ways, and there are a quantity of tools and techniques that ensure that you can have a positive outlook for you and those whom you care about.

Realizing that you have been victimized in some way by crime can have a devastating effect on one’s life. One can become a victim of crime in many different ways. Some examples of the types of crime victims that can be overcome include:

Adolescent Victims of Abuse

This could be a young, underage person who has been physically or emotionally victimized either by another adolescent or adult and may include molestation, or physical abuse resulting in injuries, like, bruising, broken bones or other maladies. This could be an immediate issue, or one that has continued to cause suffering through adulthood.

Adult Physical or Emotional Assault or Abuse

Again the spectrum covers the widest range of forms of assault or abuse. Assault or abuse can include everything from psychological manipulation or mind-control techniques to physical threat of violence or the use (real or implied) of a deadly weapon.

Gang Violence

The obvious negative effect of gangs on or society is the victimizations of others who may or may not be actively involved in the gang environment; and may include all forms of crime, violence and/or victimization.

Random Act of Violence

Occasionally victims of violence are simply in the wrong place at the wrong time when a violent act occurs. This is the most difficult type of violence to rationalize, due to its randomness. Acts of terrorism may result in violence that may be experienced as random.

Sexual Assault/Abuse

Obviously these crimes are sexual in nature but also cover a wide breadth of possible assaultive or inappropriate methods that can have an emotional impact on the victim. This category includes sexual harassment, inappropriate touching, rape, incest, exhibition or pornography without consent.

DUI or DWI Victim

These victims have special needs because there may be no logical rationalization for the victimization except for maybe being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Unlike a random act of violence, there is a definitive underlying cause of either driving under the influence or driving while intoxicated while piloting a 3,000 pound weapon. Victim may also include the driver operating a vehicle under the influence of alcohol or drugs, presenting a completely different set of emotional issues.

Human Trafficking

You might be surprised to know that human trafficking is alive and well in the USA. Often we associate human trafficking as something that only happens elsewhere.

Property Loss, Robbery, Theft, White-collar Crime

This is the most annoying type of crime for our judicial system… After all, “How would you feel if someone took something from you?” Of course the perpetrator wouldn’t like, it… but their answer is simply to re-steal it from someone else. Many thieves are psychopaths or sociopaths who have no conscious or regard for others; no social boundaries.

Usually these crimes are less violent and involve deception and manipulation to facilitate loss or injury but may have a violent influence by integrating a threat of violence (or presence of deadly weapon) in the con. May include identity theft, embezzlement or fraud whereby the perpetrator gains unfairly at the expense of the victim or arson.

Stalking

Stalking includes any unwanted contact between two persons and can occur at home, at work, or now even online. Thankfully, our judicial system has supported an effort to curtail stalking and has initiated laws to protect you from stalking and cyber-stalking.

Vulnerable Adults

Some adults, who are advanced in age or may have a physical or mental dysfunction or disability, may be more susceptible to becoming a victim of any crime. Realizing this, our government has passed new laws that offer protection and more severe penalties for defending the rights of vulnerable adults.

Elder abuse and fraud falls under this category also.

Homicide Survivors

Friends, relatives and loved-ones of murder victims often suffer emotionally and the grief from underlying unresolved issues can be debilitating.

This brief list is not by any means complete, but gives you the idea of the types of crime victims that can be overcome to stop the victimization, cessation of continued pain and discomfort and moving on victoriously in a positive manner.

Victims of crime can suffer from a variety of physical and emotional pain. Examples of issues of victims commonly addressed I have encountered with clients include:

Loss of sense of security and/or fearfulness

Ruminating or the re-playing of the event or circumstances ad nauseam

Haunted by dreams, nightmares or sleep depravation

Social withdrawal or detachment

Internalization, guilt or self-blame

Memory of concentration dysfunction

Poor self-image, helplessness

Bleak future outlook

Lack of trust

Know that you are not alone. There are specialists experienced in dealing with victims who struggle with these symptoms of crime victimization, and are well-equipped to help you deal with these and many other issues that you might be struggling with.

Review your recovery options and put you back in control of your life.